Marathon: Half Way!

Part of marathon training - a BIG part - is mental training. What do you do in your head for 6 hours? In group training, that is one of the things we figure out along the way.

Galloway pace groups are composed of mostly women. The "Fasties" have more men, but we are at least 10 groups back from them and only see their blurs as they pass us. Twice. In our typical weekly run 8-12 runners, one or two men show up. And they are the nicest men! Charles is my brother-in-law, whom I love. He also has the BEST tenor voice and spontaneously bursts out in song every so often. It's great.

So to keep our minds off of the aches and pains and negative thoughts, we chat among ourselves. In the 0430 darkness we tend to pair off, but the pairings change over the course of the run. I've never done much with groups of women, since I worked in the marina construction industry,composed mostly of men. What a perfect group to get to know. Strong women in ages ranging fro 20's to 60's.

If someone is having a physical problem, there is always a member willing to see them to the end.

Running in the Rain: Halfway

As the sun comes up, we can now see the cows in fields adjacent to the Rail Trail we are on. Our shoes never did get wet and the temperature is in the 50's. Perfect for a long run. We chat and sometimes pull out the ear buds and iPod for some musical inspiration. After months of long runs for endurance training, we are just hitting our stride at 6 miles. Time to ingest some calories and there are many forms available! Jelly Belly Sport Beans, Power Bar Power Gel Shots, GU and Clif Shot Blocks, to name a few. It's difficult to eat on the run, so these quick acting supplements were developed to keep the runner's blood sugar levels up during long periods of strenuous exercise. We schedule our food intake with water breaks to enhance digesting these concentrated concoctions. Run, walk, run. 13 miles to go, but we are close to the halfway turnaround!

Where do runners keep all the snacks, band aids, lip balm, water, car keys and various other supplies they need over the 6 hour training runs? Some shorts and tops have a pocket or two, but there is a whole market full of belts with expanding pouches and Fuel Belts with plastic bottles for water and pockets for everything else. Hydration packs like the Camelback are light weight backpacks the carry varying amounts of water that is ingested through a convenient tube. I prefer the hand held Amphipod Hydraform water bottle holder, which is comfortable for me and easily refilled. Like all of the trappings I've mentioned, you just have to try them out to see what works for you.

See you at 11.5!

Running in the Rain: Part Two

At 5 the rain stops for the moment. We all keep our ponchos on, assuming the worst. Five plus miles to the only toilet and the hydration I started at home is looking for a way out. The night is dark and cool. The clouds hide the stars we saw on our first 4:30 training run of 20 miles. Roosters crow from somewhere out in the darkness. Run, walk, run. Our water angels have already been here (how early did they get up for us?)and left coolers of cold water, electrolyte fluids, cups and trash bags. We joke and head out, some removing ponchos now wetter on the inside than out, which are then stuffed in the back of our stretchy pants. Still no rain, but as the light breaks, we can see the low, heavy, dark clouds above. Passing Mile 5, we know the bathroom isn't far away!

Our set goal is a 16 minute mile pace. We calculate that this 23 miler will take six hours and eight minutes, not including stops for water and bathroom breaks. We travel with our Pace Group aptly named The Sun Risers by previous running warriors. This is the fourth year of the National Breast Cancer Marathon and those who went before have come back to to lead us Newbies and those brave enough to do it again. They cheer us on when we are tired and rein us in when we are prancing along too fast, especially at the start, when we are all enthusiastic and rarin' to get going. Our mentors want us to finish without injury, so we can go the distance in the real race. We LOVE them, of course, because ours are the best!

Breast Cancer Marathon Countdown: 56 Days

Here's the deal:
Get up at 2:45
Put on the coffee.
Check the weather: 54 F & RAIN, ugh.
Remember my "patrons" and friends who faced chemo, hair loss, and worse.
Thank God for my good health. A little rain never hurt anyone.
Clip toenails. Grease up feet and toes.
Swipe at hair, teeth, face. Can't see my eyebrows, but at least I have them.
Get dressed, long or short sleeves??? Long.
Throw in poncho, towel & dry clothes just in case.
Food for the Run: 6 GU gels, Jelly Bellies, water, post-race drink, power bar. Check.
Eat english muffin with p-nut butter & jelly. Slurp of coffee!
GPS watch, heart monitor, Gym Boss timer, waist band snack pouch, water bottle, light & post-run food.
Yikes it's 3:30! Gotta leave!
In car - forgot to bring coffee with me!
Drive 40 minutes to the trail head on the other side of town.
Parking lot is dark- where is everyone? The run starts at 4:30.
Drat! It IS raining. On goes the poncho, 23 miles in wet shoes! REALLY?
Think again about my Breast Cancer Sisters I am supporting. I have it easy.
Ponchos are noisy! Friends offer a cheaper version that is more pliable. Nice.
Someone needs a poncho. Luckily I brought 3 and share.

And that is how it all begins...

House 4 Sale: Not Foreclosure

After a year of talking about it, we finally put our house on the market. It wasn't a difficult decision: the difficult part is getting everything up to snuff for lookers! You know how piles of things and projects that might need some attention, become invisible after a while? They fall off the "Honey Do" list. We had a lot of blind spots inside and out! So then you have to find a reliable handy man to do the work...That's a challenge! Then there's the process of picking a price range. The realtor brings comps (comparing what other similar homes are selling for, usually based on square footage). You pour over them. I think the price is too high, my husband thinks it's not high enough. So we must be in the right range. Now we have a For Sale on the lawn.

Spruce up the outside, trim the palms, power wash the concrete...plant and pot a few flowers- DONE! Oh - now we have to keep it that way! Dust, straighten, mop. Dishes in the washer. No errant socks drying on the couch. Yikes! But it's not so bad when it is just the two of us, which is why we are trying to downsize into 2 instead of 5 bedrooms.

I run an eBay store and my warehouse/office is packed tightly into one room after moving, moving, moving inventory from one closet to another. I am not disciplined enough to keep an active selling and shipping area neat! The frustrating part is that no one has been to see the house since we listed it, but it's only been three weeks.

Interested in learning more about eBay? Click here for an informative, FREE newsletter by Skip McGrath, 10 year eBay seller and trainer. It's who I've turned to for reliable information.

Running for Breast Cancer Cure

You know how things come together at just the right time? I believe it's God working in my life, others think it's Fate, Karma, but some force that puts things together for our benefit. In May, my sister-in-law quietly admitted that she was training for a marathon. Not long after that, a dear friend's daughter-in-law lost her 14 year battle with breast cancer, leaving behind a devastated young family. So when I was squeezing myself into my "big" pants, I knew the time had come.


Being retired offers time to reflect on my own life, its purpose and all those other things I "didn't have time for" with an active family to care for. Here was an opportunity for me to help change myself and become a part of an effort greater than my weight loss!

So I joined the Galloway training for the National Marathon to Finish Breast Cancer in February 2011 here in Jacksonville. Be clear about this: I am not one of those “runners”. I have never run with a group. Phil and I “slogged” regularly in our 40’s. I did one 5 K in the mid-1970’s and one in Guam in 1998 or so, while visiting our daughter and husband. I also barely “beat the bus” in the 7 Mile Bridge Run in Marathon, FL in 2006. I haven't done anything but walk a little in the last 5 years.

The Galloway program is designed by Olympic champion, Jeff Galloway, who lives in Tallahassee and is familiar with the Florida heat and humidity. His goal is to ENJOY running! Who knew? According to the program, I started out walking for 5 minutes to warm up, then "shuffle-run" for 30 seconds and walk for 30 seconds. My feet barely left the sidewalk when I "ran", but, come on, 30 seconds! Easy, even during the hottest summer on record.

Yesterday I completed 12 miles in a bit over 3 hours. Who knew?

Denise Austin Kicks My Butt!

We know it's all about calories in and calories out, right? You consume calories while eating, your body burns calories while "being". It's simple math. Consume many more than we burn and our body saves those calories for future hunting and gathering expeditions.  The only problem is that we are no longer walking for hours gathering nuts and berries or jogging across the plains in search of mammoths or even sloths. Times have changed!

We sit. And we sit alot! Turns out that sitting is about the worst thing we can be doing for our health. Especially as we age, sitting is a reward for all of our years of work! Heck, I'm retired. I just want to sit down for awhile! Sit down for long and you may not get up again!

Our bodies are made for movement. Back to the calories in, calories out formula. So that we don't store too many calories (that end up around our middles or our hips), we have to make the ratio of in:out more equal. This is all stuff we know. It's in the doing that we have problems.  Well, Denise Austin has put together a great book called "The Daily Dozen" and no, it's not about donut consumption. She has laid out three weeks of reasonably easy to prepare meals as well as twelve one-minute exercises to do daily. One minute! Even better, is the Get Fit Daily Dozen exercise DVD! She advertises that you can lose 12 pounds in three weeks, which I didn't...BUT...in doing the twelve minutes of daily movement, it got me off my - well you know what I'm saying here!

This is a perfect combination for me. After following three weeks of her recipes, I was trained well enough to know what a healthy daily intake of food is for me.  I've added some interesting foods to my repertoire and replaced some higher calorie options with healthy, (buzz word coming) "real" foods.  In addition, I was enjoying my daily dozen exercises enough that I started wanting a little more. Like taking a walk in the morning before it got too hot. You know, early mornings are very pleasant! It's quiet, the birds are all talking about the worms they caught, the problems of the world are still sleeping...I'm feeling a bit righteous. Yep. I can do this.